Michael Netzer Online - Looking at You, Joe Quesada & Dan Didio!

Frank Lee Delano

|2007-12-23 07:46:21

"But it would be even more awesome if Frank Lee Delano were to edit
it."

I'd last a week before Didio took a bat to me like DeNiro in
"Untouchables."

I've been thinking about this, and I've come up with
a few additional observations:

Old writers are getting work. Some guys just
can't write for a modern audience anymore, but plenty of others have no trouble
cashing checks. Look at someone who plainly burned out, like Marv Wolfman, or
who fell off long before the 90's, like Bruce Jones. Marv's going great guns
again, despite losing Nightwing to Pete Tomasi. Jones became a fan favorite for
the first time in his career a few years back. It seems to me that once the
backlash prevented editors from passing artists or one another writing work over
actual writers, it cleared the way for veterans to do their thing.

Meanwhile,
older artists can't catch a break. I suspect younger editors are intimidated by
artists with far more experience and typically talent than themselves. They like
to think they're writers themselves, so they relate to and feel more comfortable
influencing scripts. Meanwhile, an artist-turned-suit like Joe Quesada might
well experience the same anxiety, reenforcing the industry-wide aversion.
Further, someone like Quesada was directly influenced by a lot of guys he isn't
working. Maybe to him, these guys look "old-fashioned" to him, thanks
more to the contempt of familiarity than market demands. It reminds me of the
backlash against studio styles, like Rob Liefeld's influence at Extreme, or Neal
Adams' at Continuity. There may have been a time when a "look" ran its
course, and people avoided it for a while. However, out of the public eye for a
while, fans miss the taste, but editors retain the bias regardless.

I think
maybe the "back room" tales may be a problem, as well. Keith Giffen
likes to tell of his career ending shenanigans in the 70's, and how he only got
back into the industry after he wife begged an editor to give Giffen a second
chance. Keith then developed a reputation for reliability, practicality, and
well thought out concepts. Others, however, are likely still haunted by true and
tall tales recounted for decades and taken as fact by latecomers. Professional
lives may be ending because of the incestuous, gossipy nature of the industry.

MN	\|2007-12-24 04:57:39

You make some good observations. All of which lead to the question of why are
all these factors in play within a commercial enterprise that's meant to
maximize market profitability. The above insight into editorial policies appears
to be devoid of such concerns, and would not be allowed to be practiced for too
long within other mediums. The Film and Television industries, for example, work
with very eccentric actors, performers, writers and directors, because the
bottom line of market appeal for their work is what dictates an outlet for
it.

I've said before that the comics industry works under a unique standard
which allows its editorial policies to be relatively free of profitability
concerns, because the lion's share of revenue for DC and Marvel is in Marketing
and Licensing of their characters to other mediums. This might be one of the
reasons the comics themselves are always struggling for sales at the same time
that the characters are reaping huge profits elsewhere. So, my conclusion is
that the publishers are happy with this situation for several reasons, one of
which is in order to limit the power of the comics creator within the entire
process.

And this is the problem I see with comics creators who feel dependent
on the publishers. The fact is that a guild could very easily change this
distorted balance of forces and allow creators to reap more just rewards for the
contribution they make to the staggering success of comics properties outside of
the comics.

But it's a long process and must obviously be nurtured through the
system itself. Still, given an option of having navigated a career devoid of the
stories which have ultimately pushed me into the outer periphery of the
industry, I would not have done anything differently because of the results. I
certainly prefer the present situation to one within which I felt constrained in
my thinking, creativity and the things that I can say openly today without fear
of repercussion.

That said, I'm also convinced that some return to comics work
is in the cards for me, perhaps even this year. I know it wouldn't take much for
this to come about and strongly believe that this is the course that I'm on with
the comics industry.

Whether it'll be the Martian Manhunter or something else,
isn't as important as producing some comics again and regaining some measure of
visibility in the medium.

Thanks for the thoughtful comments.

Anonymous

|2007-12-24 06:54:23

But boy, wouldn't it be great if it were Martian Manhunter?

That said, it
seems to me that for the very reasons you state, relying on corporate comics in
the long term isn't necessarily in a creator's best interests. So long as a body
has the financial stability to pull it off, it seems to me self-publishing (or
at least going through a packager like Image) is the only way to guarantee a
favorable position in the food chain (assuming sales are there, of
course.)

While that could be an option for you, I really can't see drawing
big name characters for the Big Boys being an uphill battle for you. Tom
Derenick made a comeback to mainstream comics based on random pieces he was
selling on eBay, for crying out loud!

3.23 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."